Dominion
by xirus11
Summary: I thought of the Shadowlands trailer before it was cool. :p


Foreword

With the release of the Shadowlands expansion trailer, and its conspicuous correlation to my own headcanon, I decided to give this foreword reacting to the conspicuousness of it, fleshing out the background leading up to my headcanon for Nyx's Overt Shade in Azeroth doing what Sylvanas said but with better means and intent, and then telling the story that is presently overshadowed by this ugly mess of a retcon(literally half of WoW - the blue-grey area you go to when you die IS the Shadowlands. And your character's body can die anywhere in WoW and traverse anywhere in WoW as a spirit. So WoW itself is one half of the game - the living half. The Shadowlands - where you go when you corpse-run being the other half. So exactly 50% of the game is being retconned with this expansion and completely new, lore-rewriting areas being added that stand for views that you would typically hear from the mouth of an abuser in a controlling relationship - don't feel pride, sacrifice yourself [for what I say is] the greater good, might makes right, etc.) that is this expansion.

Said expansion and its afterlife realm seeming to be some sort of fanfiction for a child murdering totalitarian sociopath. Nyx is neither a child murderer, totalitarian, nor a sociopath. She in fact is dedicated to either slaughtering child murderers, totalitarians, and (self-ownership-rights-violating) sociopaths, or accepting their guilt-laced reparations. So if you're looking for a less nihilistic, less-morally-grey(more like morally-devoid) future for the World of Warcraft that doesn't break hope for those who still deserve to feel it on account of not choosing the actions/path of a cliche evil anti-villain, this story is for you. Genuine lack of bias does not exist, so please keep that in mind when reading my story and being tempted to claim I'm "no better" than the psychopathic/sociopathic ideologues in charge of the direction of the lore of WoW Retail.

If you have issues with my being an anarcho-capitalist and telling a story showing such views in a positive light and painting authority/government in a negative light, please remember this quote:

"My political opinions lean more and more to Anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning the abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs) — or to 'unconstitutional' Monarchy. I would arrest anybody who uses the word State (in any sense other than the inanimate real of England and its inhabitants, a thing that has neither power, rights nor mind); and after a chance of recantation, execute them if they remained obstinate! If we could go back to personal names, it would do a lot of good." - J.R.R. Tolkien.

I am not as extreme an anarchist as the late Tolkien. I would never seriously encourage execution for speech, even in cases I find it intolerable and joke/vent of such desires like executing those who call pernicious state-abetted crimes against children and humanity "fake news" - only for actions, like those Sylvanas and the Horde committed against children in Teldrassil, which Nyx subsequently restored.

I hope you can look past your own indoctrination and read this foreword and appreciate the story after. If not, that is truly a shame, and says a lot more about you than me.

This was my intention in Nyx's headcanon for years before Shadowlands was announced or even rumored. I just never wrote publicly about it. I did however talk about it privately. Also worth noting that the upcoming xpac retcons literally half of World of Warcraft - the Shadowlands is where you go when you die. As in when you corpsewalk, that's the Shadowlands. That's been canon right up to the release of that "all flash no substance" trailer meant to get those with all swag and no morals to stop remembering the fact that Blizzard censors on behalf of a political organization that rapes and murders 15 year old girls who protest against them and leaves them floating naked in a river and passes it off as suicide. And their former heads s.a. Metzen made no comment on the matter either.

The land of Bastion is not only a retcon but the propaganda of someone who thinks a mass murderer/burner/gasser of children can be a hero and/or not evil. That those who blindly follower her orders should be given blank-check forgiveness and that the organization should be allowed to continue to exist in its current form (in my headcanon, the Horde has been renamed the Honorbound). Within each of Bastion's realms are communicated the anti-virtues of "might makes right"(it is right that makes might - its why empires collapse - but that is an inconvenience to those who would rather dictate morals with law than abide by them by abiding the negative individual rights of otehrs), anti-individualism("pride is bad"), sacrifice(they are really making their ties to the Bohemian Grove and the makers of the Georgia Guidestones painfully obvious with their lawful evil druid RP), and "altruism"(narcissism for the powers-that-shouldn't-be). If Neil Degrasse Tyson is right - that "everything is true in the multiverse" - then surely one exception must be such blatant propaganda.

And now to get into my own "blatant propaganda" and lead into the version of the Shadowlands cinematic story that up until now I had kept inside of my own head and in private chats with past and present friends:

For my own take on WoW-connected spiritual realm, The Aetherial Mists(also known as Valhalla - and no not the Valhalla in Legion), the core of it is not a bastion of antitheist anarcho-capitalism and has not been for millions of years. Its been the seat of a monarch - the Soul King, Eru Illuvatar - and his Grand Priest, Archangel Auriel(also known as Akatosh). Only recently in headcanon has either woken up to the true nature of good and evil and come to Nyx's(and my) side of things. In Eru's case, sadly, making reparations was more than he could bear and more than he felt he deserved, so he gave all that comprises himself to his daughter, Era Illuvamil.

The area around the Aetherial Mists is actually the Twisting Nether. To the southwest, the consequence of that connection becomes clear when passing over the mountains and seeing a massive, barren desert. Further along you see what was once an ocean - now a chasm. Further, a large island where a grandiosely-delusional plot by Ner'zhul to invade and take the Aetherial Mists sits. There were many on the Mists side that attempted to aid Ner'zhul in his conquest of the Mists to overthrow those they were ruled by - of course, their actions would have ended up leading to genocide and the ascension of an even worse ruler. Ner'zhul was captured by Kil'jaeden before he could reach this island. The Burning Legion is unaware of the Aetherial Mists, or the fact that the ice they stole for the Frozen Throne to turn Ner'zhul into the Lich King came from regions just to the north of the Aetherial Mists. The regions of Tantalus Galazy that were terraformed by the Titans and subsequently destroyed by the Burning Legion are under a quarantine of sorts so that the Void Lords and the Burning Legion, and Demonic Legion can't affect the rest of the galaxy - Nirn, Westeros, Gainos, Tyria, and the world of Dunwall have all remained largely unaffected by the aforementioned infinite armies to deal with their own problems - daedra, child-burning gods and sabotaged constructs of a race of children, elder dragons and genocidal fire gods, and machinations of the founder of the Sith - the old Sithis.

While the threat of multiverse-eating beings known as the Maw lurk in the shadows of the Outer Void beyond the multiverses, there are mainly two primary forces at work in my headcanon - those of the Umbra Vigil and those of the Umbra Legion. The Vigil stands for anarchy/liberty and the Legion stands for statism/tyranny. The Umbra are a race of eternal beings that aren't really their own race - they are the apex of sophont evolution and are known as either surpreme gods or primordial deities or nigh-omnipotent deities throughout mythology and fiction. They represent more than ideas - they represent virtues themselves. In the case of the members of the Legion, they represent false virtues which are in some cases outright delusions - a word they would of course use to describe the virtues of the Vigil's head Umbra. Their followers certainly do often and loudly while spam-censoring anyone who stands for said virtues.

Vigil's Umbra. Leaders = Dread Lords/Commanders(a title mocked by Melkor when he corrupted the Nathrezim race).

Nyx - Truth(esp buried/occulted/"dead" truth - hence the name of her inner plane in the akasha/aether is the same as the Catholic Church's word for the truth they bury and call lies - Apocrypha).

Chaos - Liberty(Self-ownership/egoism. Total principled rights-abiding liberty. Subspace - living, unburied knowledge - being his inner plane in the akasha/aether. Can be seen in the sky above Apocrypha - shares the same dimensional space. All information ends up in the akasha and rises and falls between Apocrypha and Subspace)

Erebus(New Sithis) - Justice/Revenge/Karma(the Void - the outer one between greater multiverses, not necessarily the one of WoW - is where he presides over various hell-verses for evil souls - evil in this case decided by violations of negative individual rights, not law. The worst ones - acts of tyranny - involve initiatory rights infringements such as rape, slavery, murder, and ruling over another non-tyranny-complicit individual.)

Legion's Umbra. Rulers = Gods, Devils, etc.

Yahweh(R'hllor) - Collectivism/Sacrifice("we are all one consciousness" is what he would have liked to achieve - all one, devoured, as part of his own.)

Lucifer(also R'hllor until ~2k years before present) - Ignorance/Lies ("Truth" to those who don't know any better and who disbelieve karma because of how effectively-divorced from it the world is.)

Ananke(Asherah) - Fate(itself being quite a delusional-but-sadly-reinforced concept when considering quantum physics and how time actually works.)

Pherus(Old Sithis) - Nihilism(particularly moral nihilism)

Melkor(Morgoth Bauglir, "evil twin" / doppleganger of Chaos) - Just Rule("I would use this ring from a desire to do good". See my short story "A Desire To Do Good" for more on the Ring of Power.)

Hypnus - Power(Betrayed the Vigil, betrayed the Umbra Legion, then got killed and devoured by Yahweh himself and ended up[due to Yahweh's inferior capacity for devouring fellow Umbra leaving the souls open to reincarnation as was the case of Angel and Ori being reincarnated as Ichigo and Orihime] as Aizen in Bleach, and got himself locked in Soul Society for betraying them and trying to murder Ichigo, Orihime, Ichigo's two young sisters, and a town with a population of over 10,000, comprised at least mostly of innocent men, women, and children. Had actually succeded in the latter to a point thanks to the soul sucker devices he gave his arrancar. Hypnus claimed to personify power but in reality he merely drifted with power - first the Legion then his own consience then himself. Time will tell if he follows power, like the seemingly-superior power of the masses/populism, or follows what's right for a change. No, I don't think populism is a good thing nor do I think it would ever back what the Vigil stands for. And I consider populism to be another word for democracy. There's a better chance for minarchist monarchy like Tolkien considered himself for[that or anarchy] than minarchist democracy, because monarchy has only one or a few despots forcing their will via law on others as opposed to millions or billions. I'm obviously against both - especially considering we're clearly at and beyond totalitarianism - total control - on both a national and global level. To claim that a government that controls you on such an intimately-personal level from work to sexuality to addiction/habits to when your own life starts and ends is not totalitarian is both extremely delusional and a total denial of reality itself.)

Those are the main actors on both sides. Melkor destroyed Tantalus Galaxy by overloading a device meant to destroy Yahweh's army of ascended beings known as the Ori - the Tantalus Device. That lead to the Aetherial Mists and Tantalus Galaxy as they are known today. While billions of years were spent recreating some systems in time dilation fields, overall Tantalus Galaxy in its current chaos/ki("magic") energy-filled/dominated state is only a few millions years old. So young that the Alterans who fled Avalon and didn't settle in the galaxies of Stargate Atlantis and Star Wars ended up beating Destiny and making it here before the calamity, which provided evidence of the threat the Ori posed.

Over time, the Umbra Vigil came out of the shadows after millions of years in exile, encouraged by those who supplanted them from their own home galaxy after those that put them in power - the Umbra Legion - destroyed it, leading to how it is known today. Nyx ultimately generated five shades( projections/manifestations of her consciousness and raw spiritual, mental, and physical power) to deal with the problems that the aformentioned government had failed to - a shade for Tyria, two Shades for Azeroth, a shade for Sanctuary(Diablo 3), and a clone-shade for Nyx's old and present homeworld, Nirn(The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim). Chaos, while sealed, was able to, with Nyx's aid, blow apart and devour the already-infiltrated/possessed consciousness of R'hllor/Yahweh after the burning of Shireen Baratheon marked the last straw and sent Chaos into a state of overwhelming psychic rage. Eventually, in despair, he desired to commit suicide, but was rendered physically and mentally incapable of performing the act as part of the long-term effect of drugs that had been used to brainwash and essentially borg-ify him from when he was a small child to young adulthood. The intent manifested a soul-splitting event that lead to the creation of a Shade that succeeded in the act and incarnated back in time to meet her sister's Shade in Tyria.

Before that, Nyx sent a Shade to do what the Gods of Tyria could not - subjugate and destroy the Elder Dragons once and for all, and without letting the rest of the energy in Tyria vaporize half the universe in a massive explosion that would blow a hole in the universe itself - a machination set in place by Melkor back when he still had enough precognitive powers and capacity to control the future to rival said powers in his doppelganger Chaos and his sister Nyx. To start, two of those Gods and two of the Elder Dragons needed to be defeated outright: Abyddon, Zhaitan, Mordremoth, and Balthazar. After the death of Balthazar, Erebus, Nyx and Chaos' son whom they consider a brother, came himself and subjugated and consumed Kralkatorrik. Then, Nyx's Shade in Tyria came and consumed the energy of the mysterious Deep Sea Elder Dragon, leaving herself, Erebus, Chaos' Shade in Tyria, Umbra Vigil Captain Tenebra Susurro to take up task of feeding the energy to Nyx's Shade in Tyria along with the excess energy building up in Tyria threatening to explode it. That energy is being channeled into the Staff of the Mists and the Queen's Gate from Gainos to open a portal to free Chaos from the body and reality he is still trapped in as of typing this.

Nyx's Shade in Tyria was generating another shade during the plot leading to the destruction of Zhaitan on another world not far away from Tyria: Azeroth. In the kingdoms of Dalaran and Lordaeron, her expertise on necromancy and chronomancy and vampirism would surely be needed to stop the machinations of those who seek to enslave the dead, feast on the living, and create/uphold such a dystopic, bitter, sweet-less future that all who even witnessed it would long to stay in the past. With the fate of the last Titan world-soul, in essence, a little girl of her kind, hanging in the balance. And already a being from that quarantine zone had caused mass destruction, misery, and death to a large swath of land to the south of her with the scepter of that corrupted Titan Sargeras. As she stayed, she saw that no one thought Sargeras, a pathetic construct of the Valar, could be defeated. Over time, she was captured by and escaped from Arugal but not before being afflicted with the worgen curse - and her Shade's body was taken by the Lich King and raised in undeath and brainwashed into serving all Nyx stood against, though eventually that body was freed at Light's Hope Chapel and Nyx's consciousness returned to claim it. That Shade went on to establish a new future - though she was betrayed by Wrathion who preferred the company and bad ideas of Garrosh and the Void-corrupted Infinite Dragonflight. In the end Wrathion's foolishness lead to the Legion invading once more.

From the Umbra Vigil's outpost in Lunarfall, Shadowmoon Valley, that stretches across dimensions to the Outland and includes the recently-conquered Deathforge, she planned a full-scale that would destroy the Legion once and for all right when it began its final, doomed invasion of Azeroth - not only destroy the Legion and Sargeras, but subjugate it to be another vanguard force of the Vigil like her brother Chaos has served as - maybe giving him a break from being the vanguard that he sorely needs. The plan was to free him by the time of the Southern Soul King's death - the one of the anime Bleach(which shares an earth with the Stargate shows in my headcanon) - but instead a time dilation quarantine was asked for by Chaos and initiated by Nyx - the universe/reality he is stuck in were placed in a time dilation field of 1 second = 55 billion years starting on the morning of June 19th, 2016, Dimension 5(Stargate/Bleach Earth) time. The closest thing to keeping the cliche evil of the reality Chaos is a nigh-powerless prisoner of war in contained in temporal stasis without freezing time entirely.

Unfortunately, some areas had to be kept in that quarantine as well until they were dealt with - like Tyria. And in the other quarantine field, around the Burning Legion and Azeroth, that meant one being and his Infinite Dragonflight were able to latch onto the field and make an alternate reality in a vain attempt to save themselves - which led to the in-game timeline and the events of the Legion and Battle for Azeroth expansions. To deal with this, Nyx's Shade in Azeroth made another, covert Shade in Azeroth named Puntificate - a gnome priest that could command the power of the Light and the Void and sought specialty in commanding the Void to deal with the Old Gods and Void Lords once and for all. This led to the behind-the-scenes establishing of alliances, aided by psychicly showing many of them the dire threat looming over them that far overshadowed even the Void Lords - the machinations of the now-fallen Umbra Legion and their desperate attempts to drive Chaos to pure insanity and corrupt him to their side. Pherus had fallen to Erebus after the events of the first Dishonored game - leading to Erebus, the true Outsider, to become Sithis. Lucifer was defeated by devouring via an alliance between Yahweh's son Jesus and Chaos. Melkor was sealed in a cage by Nyx, first as a head and a torso but then just as a head. Ananke - Asherah - was also defeated not long after Yahweh when she emotionally left the seal Chaos is stuck in and attempted to avenge her fallen Umbra Legion Lord breatheren and late husband Yahweh. There were no longer any Umbra left active on the Umbra Legion's side. The Umbra Legion was effectively dismantled, leaving only all the depraved organizations known as governments and organizations that colluded with them from religions to so-called "companies" left that they had long normalized and established across much of known existence in place to do their evil work - many of them not even realizing they were committing evil, only thinking it deep down in the bowels of their buried consciences. Getting people to unbury that truth inside of themselves, accept it, and help stop it, would be the key to not only saving Chaos and Azeroth but every innocent in existence. Getting people to relinquish their control over others and over bad ideas and bad timeways would eventually lead to the true ending of Alliance and Horde hostilities - and the chronomantic resurrection and restoration of Southshore, Teldrassil, Steamwheedle Port, and Theramore.

Sargeras and N'zoth(along with the remaining Old Gods and the Sha) of that alterate reality were destroyed and consumed by Nyx's Shades in Azeroth after the resurrection of Teldrassil, which occurred just after the conclusion of the main story of Battle for Azeroth patch 8.2.5. The Sword in Silithis was converted to pure blue Chaos/ki energy, and then into arcane, light, and life energy to restore Azeroth, creating another Well of Eternity in the process and turning Silithis into a jungle even more lush than the one in neighboring Un'goro Crater. The energy was used to make a swath of similar forest from Silithus up to the shores of Darkshore south of Teldrassil. A great line spanning the length of Kalimdor's western shore. Desolace and the Stonetalon Mountains were now similar to Ashenvale and Ferelas in apperance.

The energy from Sargeras, from the Old Gods and then the Void Lords, from Tyria, from the fallen Umbra Legion lords, from the daedra, and from Nyx herself, was then used to further work on the portal intended to free her trapped brother Chaos. From the same stone structure she used to restore Teldrassil, she manifested a clone of her Shade in Tyria in the body and clothing of the pre-undead, pre-worgen past of her Shade in Azeroth, and after phasing herself to avoid alarming the newly-resurrected citizens of Teldrassil, she began casting her portal.

But it still wasn't enough. The Legion and the Void that she had by now conquered wasn't the only threat she was going to crush alongside her brothers Chaos and Erebus. She wanted to make sure that the Lich King could never again pose a threat to Azeroth, and that the undead - those among them who are evil and deserve to remain possessed - would be as much of a vanguard of the Umbra Vigil as their newly-subjugated voidspawn and demons. She had already dealt with Palawa Joko and Harkon and Malthael. It was time to destroy the Lich King and set Bolvar and her fellow Knights of the Ebon Blade free forever and forge their own destiny. It was time to claim the vaunted, overblown Helm of Domination.

From the Gate of Horror

Nyxshade could feel the cold chill on her pale skin as she flew over the ramparts of Corp'rethar on the back of Sahsilbah's frostwyrm form. Up above her she could feel the presence of the present Lich King. Tortured, conflicted, burdened. If only Arthas had felt this instead. If only Sylvanas had felt this instead. Perhaps they would have sensed their next lives and sought to evade them properly. But that's in the past. The future is what she had to remain focused on - in the name of justice for the past and liberty for the present.

Sahsilbah flew to the front steps where the door was still hammered ajar by the argent crusade's battering ram, and dismounted. Sahsilbah gave Nyxshade a look of concern for her and asked "I know you've defeated many powerful beings, but this isn't merely Arthas you're trying to vanquish and subjugate. This is the very essence of the Lich King itself. That essence has conqured dragons, demons, mortals, and gods alike as if they were all the same. And it uses your own powers, your own ice, and your own..."

"If you're so concerned feel free to fly above and rain ice down on Bolvar until he cools off and sees reason." Nyx said with a smirk. Sahsilbah laughed at her dark sense of humor - Bolvar having been afflicted with scorched skin by the flames of his still-living red kin. In another timeline Nyx saw Bolvar asking him to murder and resurrect one of those so-called guardians of life. She saw Bolvar asking him to murder innocent Argent Crusaders at Light's Hope as well. She saw herself not going down such paths, because ultimately they would not lead to anything good. Sacrifice begets sacrifice, and right makes might. To sacrifice her righteousness would ultimately lead to the loss of her powers and her genuine death and nonexistence, or worse. As it had with Melkor and the rest of the Umbra Legion. A severed head floting in such agony - and after a while no boobs! Her brother, another unique burn victim, would be pissed. Hopefully he doesn't dwell on that thought too long when he sees it via imagination - via akashic vision. She knew her brother's seemingly-to-many-to-be-already-nonexistent sanity was hanging by a thread, and that Nyx herself, her shades, and her "company" - family, friends, etc - are the fabric of that thread.

"I hear that there are already plenty of other frost wyrms with your fellow Ebon Blade knights on them poised to aid you should it come to that, but I'll happily fight alongside you to the bitter end. May Death win against...Death..." Sahsilbah joked, as he spread his wings and playfully blew the frigid air in Nyxshade's face as he took off, screwing up her hair a bit in the process. Nyxshade adjusted it as she smiled with a look of mock contempt in her eyes as she shouted "I'll try not to fling a piece of saronite architecture directly at your horns during the fight!" at him as he flew away.

"I suppose its only natural for him to doubt the outcome of the fight considering what I told him and the rest about the 'creation' of Tantalus Galaxy - and all my powers over the future did to prevent it. That and my brother's crippling paranoia and concern for me has probably rubbed off on him. I've heard enough 'stay fine, alive, and the truth Nyx and company''s to make 'Friday''s lyrics sound creative." Nyxshade thought to himself as she entered the gates of the icy citadel. How many times had her brother walked through this same entrance but never actually done so himself? The despair and misery and cynicism matched by force of will and defiance each time with only a glimmer of hope that always got dashed at the top for over a year or two before he finally realized that I, mage, invented the very "crack pony" that Arthas modeled Invincible after, and stopped feeding the covert psychological torture he was being put through. "Random number generation-based loot, my ass", Nyxshade thought, "Don't worry, brother, I'll get you out of that living hell soon. You won't die like that if I have any say in the matter. At the very least, I promise I'll be here when you return." Live. That was what her brother Chaos shouted for nearly a year. Live and protect as many innocents as she could. "and company". And that's exactly what she was going to do.

Old Enemies, New Friends

As she ascended the tower she noticed a total lack of resistance. The undead stood and watched as she walked down the halls, through the cathedral, and entered the elevator. She took it up and saw a ship docked where the Alliance gunship once was - it was a former Horde zeppelin - now a zeppelin of the Honorbound.

"Figured we'd give you a lift up." Thalyssra said as Nyxshade boarded the red-flagged vessel.

"Thanks." Nyxshade said. She knew her brother probably wouldn't believe what was happening to be possible. She looked over at the orcs and tauren and elves that glanced at her in fear before turning back with a measure of shame in their eyes. In the case of some of the blood elves she could sense anger. "Have you ever considered making arcwine more widely available? Perhaps to this ship? I'd buy it myself. I can feel the cold air here more than the rest of Icecrown."

She started picking out the angriest of the blood elves. "Hey, what's your favorite wine?"

"Dalaran red" shot the blood elf, clearly irritated at Nyxshade's participation in the purge of Dalaran, that resulted in many of his fellow Horde-complicit blood elves killed. A just action against a violent organization that had already repeatedly taken the lives of innocent men, women, and children that Nyxshade held no regret for, and surely if this blood elf was reasonable he'd see that, but he wasn't, and it was affecting the mood and not helping the overall mission.

Nyxshade conjured an entire keg right at the blood elf's feet as the zeppelin arrived at its destination. "I've been talking to Lorth'remar about plans to try to undo some of the damage the Scourge and Forsaken did to the areas that were part of the Kingdom of Quel'thelas. If you have any family that died then-"

"My brother died in Dalaran, not Quel'thalas." - the blood elf interrupted.

"Guys-" Thalyssra interjected.

"And I lost a lot of good friends and lovers in Theramore." - Kalserra interjected as she stood at the dock, her tall night elven form blinking out of stealth with a black Umbra Vigil scouter eyepatch in place of her usual mask. She clearly had been waiting for quite some time. The anger in the blood elf's brow softened to realization as Kalserra continued, "Thankfully they're alive again. With time, maybe you'll see your brother again wearing one of these." as Kalserra pointed at her eyepatch. "Until then, please remember that, while we can't speak for the rest of the Alliance, we would never harm an innocent person - nor choose to act complicitly in the harm of innocents. Accept what you and your brother did and be thankful that at least one of you has gotten the chance to live."

"He was the one who deserved to", the blood elf said as he cried.

"I know." Nyxshade replied. "That's why he's already wearing an eyepatch. He's still training and hasn't been assigned yet. He understand why I did what I did and regrets the path that you went down over him. Have a drink. We're all here and we're alive with a bright future ahead of us as long as our actions earn it."

"We'll do our best, but...", the blood elf said as he cracked an awkward smile among tears, "I actually hate Dalaran red and have grown partial to Northrend Honey Mead - what me and my brother drank together before the purge."

"See? We have the same taste in mead, why not the same taste in morals?" Nyxshade smiled as she converted the Dalaran red cask to a Northrend Honey Mead cask and turned and walked away.

"Be sure to stay alive...or well, in your case, keep the un- in undead.", Thalyssra replied. "Azeroth can't afford to lose anyone who can conjure alcoholic drinks that easily."

Nyxshade smiled. "Don't worry. In fact I'm about to add another to the world shortly."

"When you get him out, tell him." Thalyssra paused. "Tell him I understand. We understand. And that he's welcome in Suramar."

"And Quel'thalas" the blood elf added.

They said their goodbyes and zeppelin took off and flew to join the Alliance gunship nearby that was bracing for the result of this fight if if bode poorly for them.

"Thank you." Nyxshade said.

"Don't mention it." Kalserra replied. "They need to understand that actions have consequences, and so does blank check forgiveness. If we keep letting them do whatever they want to whoever they want, eventually they will be the only ones left, and not long after nothing will be. You showed me this. Reality showed us both. The key to breaking the cycle of abuse is personal responsibility, and accepting when you've done wrong instead of trying to spread it to everyone. Either that or locking abusers in Hell."

"At the rate things have been going I was starting to get concerned that overpopulation theory might actually gain credence there." Nyxshade joked, but without smiling.

"Well, when there is no more room in Hell..." Kalserra smirked, raising her eyebrows to convey a sense of hope.

"Chaos isn't bound for Hell and he isn't dead yet." Nyxshade replied with a determined look on her face.

"Those pernicious child-eating assholes that have been torturing him sure are." Kalserra replied while turning to follow.

"Does it count as a mass shooting if I aim at those assholes discriminately instead of indiscriminately?" Bourque(human hunter) added as he and Shunlin(pandaren monk) walked up to join the forming raid party.

"Let's hope we can at least extract Chaos first without anyone getting shot, because if anyone does, it may be him, sadly." Shunlin added.

"They'll probably report and censor what he's typing right now," Bourque replied, "so I'm not sure that such a lofty goal will work out too well."

"Your fucking mass shooter jokes don't help" Shunlin replied with a touch of irritation. "If he does you're sleeping on the couch for a night".

"That's okay Chaos can take over for me! In his present state it'll be a BMI match on top of a love match!" Bourque added as Shunlin shot him an angry look.

"Kids don't make me put you on time out." Puntificate added as she joined the group, fully aware of and relishing the irony of a gnome calling a tall hunter and pandaren kids. "We have a job to do, regardless of whether evidence of its existence will inevitably be censored and overwritten by some pedovore incel's corporation-pushed fanfiction in another reality. Now let's do our job as part of an anti-pedovore incel's fanfiction."

Everyone busted up laughing at the fourth wall breaking as they went up with the ultimate intent of breaking it even more.

Knocking On Heaven's Door

Nyxshade transformed into her worgen form as she approached the teleport pad to the top of Icecrown Citadel. Bourque and Kalserra took up position in stealth on the spires behind The Frozen Throne. Shunlin hovered in the air behind those spires, ready to direct Bolvar's attacks back on himself. Puntificate waited in the Void shifting slightly into the Shadowlands, ready to intervene should the need arise. Frostwyrms circled like vultures around the pinnacle of the citadel, ready to swoop in and do their part. Acherus, Naxxrammas, and other necropoli hovered around the citadel, lying in wait.

As Nyxshade materialized on the teleportation pad in front of the Frozen Throne, she saw Bolvar, no longer encased in ice, rise up from his chair. His mace was in his hand. As expected, this would not be resolved without a fight.

"I hear the Umbra Vigil are well known for their strict fidelity. You promised to keep my presence as the Lich King a secret." Bolvar angrily stated.

"And I did. Chaos made no such promise. It was his mind that contained the truth of your present state of torment. I merely showed my allies his mind. Plenty of my own secrets were revealed in the process. Surely you don't consider my attempts to solicit empathy for my tormented brother a breaking of that promise? He knows how it feels to burn alive without the release of death, too." Nyxshade replied.

"Chaos is exactly what you will get if you destroy this helm." Bolvar replied.

"The word you're looking for is 'disorder'. Truly, that is the state my brother is trapped in, but it is not who he is, nor what the word from his name truly means. I won't bother to try to explain how it means spontaneous order, or point out all the innocent souls that helm keeps enslaved that deserve to be freed - I'll simply remind you of the past you're trying and failing to bury." Nyxshade replied.

"And what past would that be?" Bolvar asked.

"Yours. You do recall when Onyxia ruled Stormwind?" Nyxshade asked.

"Yes. A life ago now, but I do. What of it?" Bolvar replied.

"So you remember the disorder of that time. How much did it really improve when she was deposed? When you took charge? Or Varian? Or Anduin again?" Nyxshade asked.

Bolvar laughed. "We both stand for what we believe to be right. So let's face off - again in the case of part of myself - and see if the might your righteousness has made for you outweighs my own."

"Very well. My allies won't interfere - unless you summon 'help'". Nyxshade said with a combat-thirsty smile.

"My mind hasn't been corrupted that much just yet" Bolvar said with a smile as he raised his mace and sent a flurry of frigid air racing at Nyxshade.

Nyxshade, immune to cold, brushed off the attack. "You know that by 'help' I didn't mean skeletons. We're both necromancers here." she said as she began casting a spell to summon five geists.

Bolvar laughed "A measly five? I thought you were Death?" as countless undead crawled up the walls, all summoned by him.

"Raising the dead takes a lot of energy, and I'm stingy. Turning them, on the other hand..." Nyxshade began to turn the attacking undead, turning the fight into a mental contest between herself and the Helm of Domination, wave after wave of ghouls and geists and abominations rammed into each other causing the entire citadel to shake.

Bourque trembled a bit, looking up at bitter envy at Shunlin who just kept gracefully hovering in the air between himself and Kalserra, who made him look like almost as much of a klutz as Chaos in his present state. The look in Kalserra's eyes was one of utter glee. Joy even, at watching her lover and commander fight.

"I tire of this," Bolvar said after a time before slamming his mace into the ground and wiping all the undead from the platform. Nyxshade just stood there, unaffected and smiling, as she held her empowered Quel'Delar in her hand.

Bolvar came and swung at Nyxshade. Nyxshade parried with her sword, pushing back the mace. They each struck at each other, and each time Nyxshade parried and avoided inflicting any serious wounds on Bolvar. "He may be immortal, but he will tire." Nyxshade thought.

That took a bit longer than she would have liked, so Nyxshade did a blade split, and as Bolvar went to cleave into her head with his mace, Nyxshade parried, and then came from the side and shattered the hilt with the other blade. The force knocked Bolvar back and struck a scar across his chest that immediately began to heal.

Nyxshade and Bolvar stared each other down with Bolvar breathing heavily as he held the shattered hilt up as Nyxshade stood over him with her now-re-merged sword.

After a few moments, Bolvar dropped the hilt on the ground, and Nyxshade kicked it to the side.

"I hope you are right." Bolvar said.

"Don't worry - I am." Nyxshade replied, as she stretched her left hand out and pulled the Helm of Domination off of his head, casting a healing spell on Bolvar in the process.

By the time the helm was off, Bolvar's flesh was almost completely healed, pale again, and he was shivering.

"S-sorry I-I t-took i-it t-too b-blows, c-champion..." Bolvar said as Nyxshade conjured a warm blanket and threw it at Bolvar.

"I-it's o-ok I-I w-wanted i-it t-to b-b-be a-a-a f-f-fight a-a-anyway" Nyxshade replied in her gruff worgen voice as Bolvar laughed at her mocking his shivering. "By the way I'm not judging you I know how cold it is." which prompted Bolvar to follow her eyes and cover his recently-exposed crotch while blushing.

"How's my daughter?" Bolvar asked after a long, awkward pause.

"Fine" Nyxshade replied. "In fact your kid and the one you once guarded might end up an item." Nyxshade smirked.

"Glad to hear. I can't think of a better match. I wish them both the world." Bolvar said.

A portal to Dalaran opened at the base of the citadel, and as Bolvar walked through, Nyxshde responded, "Its theirs. And ours. And every child on it's, including the one inside of it - Azeroth."

"And one day soon...", as she consumed the crown in a mass of black Apocrypha tentacles, and the bottom of the spire of Dovahndor / Sjel Blad (Soul Blade) Castle seen above her head as she began to assimilate Icecrown Citadel into that interdimensional base in Sovngarde, making Icecrown Citadel the Umbra Vigil's outpost in Azeroth, "...it will be my brother's, as well."


End file.
